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Congratulations to former Olmstead Williams Communications’ summer intern, Tara Joshi, freshman at Dartmouth College and finalist in Dartmouth Idol.

“Although we didn’t know about Tara’s wonderful voice when we hired her, we did know she was a rock star in communications. Dartmouth is lucky to have her,” says Tracy Williams, founder and CEO of Olmstead Williams Communications, “we are expecting a visit and perhaps a performance over her Spring break.”

Constantly expanding digital readership makes news stories published by credible third parties more important than ever to brands, businesses and causes. That makes our PR firm want to celebrate.

Check out the infographic we developed below — ‘How Relevant is News Media in 2015?’ — or view and share it online.

Austin Beutner, the new publisher of the Los Angeles Times, gave a speech earlier this month at Town Hall Los Angeles in which he claimed that on any given Sunday, 4 million people see the articles on the newspaper’s front page — more than four times their print circulation. That’s exciting news to me, because it means that despite stagnating subscriptions, the number of people who interact with the news media is on the rise. I think it makes our work more relevant than ever.

To put this in historical context, the Sunday print circulation of the LA Times — or the number of hard-copy papers they print — is currently about 955,500, a figure that has remained fairly constant for the past five years. Ten years ago, when the majority of us still received our news from traditional media, the Sunday circulation was almost 1.4 million. Today, millions more see the paper as digital readership expands.

Online access to news already trumps print circulation, and content viewed through mobile apps on smartphones and tablets has shown tremendous growth, with mobile-exclusive users increasing 85 percent in the past year. Does the larger overall readership footprint mean PR firms can tell clients their services are actually four times more valuable? Maybe.

We think The Fourth Estate is alive and well. News is still news, and facts are still facts. It’s how we get them that’s changing. So, many happy returns, Los Angeles Times. Keep on rocking, Washington Post. And may your mastheads always fly high, New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.

Olmstead Williams Communications embraces the changes, and we can’t wait to see what’s next. Happy New Year!

Eke brings a diverse five-year background in all forms of communications, from writing and appearing on camera as the talent to creating the content and design for email blasts, blogs, social media and infographics.

For the first time ever, social media allows you to measure the impact of conversations on your business, something not so easy to quantify in the real world. It’s critical to understand what works in your social media — so you can do more of it — and what doesn’t — so you can stop doing it — as you build one-to-one relationships that engage customers, prospects and media while driving revenue.

Analytics are the key to learning how to best allocate time and resources, but social media data can be overwhelming. Here are four tips to get you started:

Tip #1: Set your KPIs (Key Performance Indicators.) Set a goal for each social media platform such as number of fans/followers, number of active fan/followers or website traffic driven from posts. Then, look at your analytics with that goal in mind. Did you reach your goal? How did you do it? If you didn’t hit the targets, what went wrong? Are you posting at a time when your fans aren’t active online? Are you using the platform the way it was intended?

Although the “People Reached” may be a much larger number, shares show which posts really resonate with your audience.

Tip #2: Start Small. Try to focus on just one aspect of engagement, like “Content Shares” which is the number of times your fans and followers repost your content. Although the “People Reached” may be a much larger number, shares show which posts really resonate with your audience. Compare previous, current and future shares and adjust your content accordingly to encourage future engagement.

Tip #3: Own your brand. You should analyze what’s working for your competitors as well. When do they post? How do they interact with their community? You can learn from the competition without copying content or strategy. Keep a unique identity with content and the voice of your brand.

Tip #4: Experiment and practice. Know that you probably won’t achieve your goal overnight regardless how dedicated you are to pouring through analytics. Understanding how to best manage your social media channels takes time and testing. Try different strategies and use the data to measure your success. Just because something works for a competitor doesn’t mean it will work for you.

Diving into your analytics but having some problems? Give us a call and we’ll steer you in the right direction.

Olmstead Williams Communications CEO Tracy Williams was featured in the Los Angeles Business Journal‘s Executive Style for here innovative way of combining appropriate business attire with work out clothing.

Williams often meets with clients during workouts, making the gym an extension of her office – and her exercise clothes an extension of her work wardrobe.

The firm is being recognized in two categories – Reputation/Brand Management, Corporate/Business for its ongoing work to maintain and grow Big Four firm EY’s market position in the West, and Ongoing Product or Service Program, Business-to-Business for helping Oberthur Technologies lead the conversation about protecting consumers in the wake of major data breaches at Target and other retailers. Winners will be announced at the awards show on November 19.

Olmstead Williams Communications CEO Tracy Williams, was selected to speak at SUSTAINATOPIA on October 30 for a panel on Lead By Example: Maintaining Authenticity. Keynote speakers are Kyra Sedgwick and Philippe Cousteau Headline. SUSTAINATOPIA is a catalyst for companies, entrepreneurs and political and cultural leaders to create a more economically viable and socially just world. The event will be held from October 29 through November 2 at the Hyatt Regency in Century City.

Olmstead Williams Communications’ CEO, Tracy Williams, will be speaking for two classes at Chapman University on the importance and relevance of crisis communications planning for individuals and their brand. The graduate students in Robin Moore’s Principles of Crisis Management class have discussed major headlining crisis management events such as the BP Spill, Papa John’s deliveryman rant and Carnival Cruises ill employees, and will now dive into the personal side of crisis management. The same principles apply, crisis is not a matter of if but when. Tracy’s main focus will be helping the students understand and plan for these moments in their lives.

About three months ago, I had to get an MRI for a knee checkup. Anyone who has ever had an MRI knows that you have to lie completely still or else the scan will be blurry. So I found myself with 20 minutes of nothingness – no movement, no phone, no internet, no book – it was just me, my thoughts and the numbing sound of the machine. My mind started to wander and it quickly ended up at the question that hovers over any soon-to-be university graduate: what should I do after I finish school?! I would like to work in PR, this much I know. My internship at OWC was a valuable first step for me, but where to go from there? It has been almost two years since I went to Los Angeles, so I’ve been feeling like I have to do something to get back in the game. Well, it was while I was lying in the MRI scanner that I figured it out: I should do a recipe website. It all made sense: I love to cook and bake, I enjoy writing about things that interest me, and if I created my own website, I could also gain some valuable PR know-how. This seemed like the perfect plan, and I eagerly went home to start working on my little project.

The first thing I did was to decide what I wanted my page to be like. There are countless of recipe websites, let alone food blogs, so it was important for me to find a niche that had not yet been explored. I came up with a concept that reflected who I am, and that I thought could be successful: fun family style recipes from Europe and beyond, accessible to Europeans as well as Americans (and others, of course!). I also debated for a long time whether I should do a blog or a regular website. I went for a mix between the two! What I like about blogs is that people can see right away what the newest posts are, but I find that websites are often more clearly laid out, with a distinct menu bar and a more user-friendly setup.

Having a concrete idea of the website in mind, I then thought about a name for my “brand”. Obviously, the name had to be catchy, but I also wanted it to be “transparent”, which means that people intuitively understand what a word or phrase means. I decided to call it “The Kitchen Corner”. Intuitively, people will know that The Kitchen Corner has something to do with food, and the simple name with a positive ring is in line with the easy and tasty dishes I want to write about. I checked online to make sure that no website called The Kitchen Corner already existed, and I was in luck. Now that the name was settled, it was time to get serious!

To create your own website, you have to get a domain. A domain is basically an address, or a piece of “internet land”, that you buy the rights for from a web hosting service. Because I am not an apt web designer, I chose a web host that allows you to use WordPress (WP) for the domain you bought. This is great because as soon as your domain has been activated (which usually only takes a few hours), you can get started with designing your website using WP as a framework. WP has hundreds of different themes and customization options, so you can create a personalized layout that meets your needs exactly. For the layout of The Kitchen Corner, I chose a clean and feel-good look with recognition value. It took me about 6 weeks until I was happy with the layout of the website – 6 weeks of intense googling and watching video tutorials with the occasional verbal assault against my laptop! And then, I could finally start writing and “PR-ing”!

Before going public, I wrote an about page, as well as five recipes as a starting point. This way, first time visitors of the page could see right away what the idea behind the website was, and what kind of recipes they could expect to see in the future. I also created a Facebook page to go hand in hand with the homepage. The purpose of it is that people who are interested in The Kitchen Corner, can “like” it on Facebook, where they will be informed when a new recipe goes online. Social media are a must if you want to maintain an online presence, and users are much more likely to comment on the links posted on social media platforms that on the website itself. In addition, I downloaded an SEO plug-in to my website, which helps you write your posts with a certain SEO key word in mind. The aim of that is to increase potential traffic and to decide yourself what the snippet preview of each page should look like on search engine result pages. And, finally, I also went old school and ordered some business cards with my logo and a slogan on it: “Simple, tasty, family style recipes – from my kitchen to yours…”

I am glad I put my plan into action, and seeing the result is very rewarding, even though running the website is taking up a lot of my free time. For the The Kitchen Corner to keep growing, I am always on the look for new ways to make it stand out. I have many ideas, but first, I should probably finish my degree!

P.S.: If you are curious about The Kitchen Corner, check out the website at www.thekitchencorner.net. And don’t hesitate to share this if you like the page!

“Both of these companies are providing advanced technology solutions to improve efficiency, reduce costs and save the planet. It makes us proud to be a part of their success, and this is the area where we thrive,” said Tracy Williams, CEO and president of Olmstead Williams Communications.